PM hosts dinner for UPA allies, Left

New Delhi, Mar 21 (UNI) Top leaders of the ruling UPA alliance and those from the Left parties supporting the coalition Government from outside attended a dinner hosted by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at his residence here tonight on conclusion of the first phase of the Budget Session of Parliament.

According to Congress sources, those who attended the dinner included Congress President Sonia Gandhi, External Affairs Minister Pranab Kumar Mukherjee, Home Minister Shivraj Patil and Finance Minister P Chidmabaram among his Cabinet colleagues and NCP President Sharad Pawar, RJD supremo Lalu Prasad Yadav, LJP President Ram Vilas Paswan and DMK leader and Union Minister Dayanidhi Maran and PDP patron Mufti Mohammed Sayeed, among the allies.

Besides, CPI-M leader Sitaram Yechury, CPI leaders A B Bardhan, D Raja and leaders from the Forward Bloc and RSP from the Left parties partook of the dinner.

The meeting came in the backdrop of the Nandigram violence in West Bengal last week when over a dozen farmers were killed in police firing while resisting the takeover of their land for development of a Special Economic Zone(SEZ) by the state Government.

The dinner meeting provided an opportunity to the Prime Minister to mend fences with his ally CPI-M, which has become a target of scathing criticism lately not only from the Opposition NDA but also from the ruling Congress in the wake of the Nandigram violence.

The Prime Minister is also understood to have sought at the meeting the Left parties cooperation in pending legislations to carry forward the economic reforms on crucial policy issues including insurance and banking sectors and pensions. The Government proposes to increae the FDI cap in insurance sector from 26 to 49 per cent and to allow foreign players in general insurance.

The meeting, in which the issues of Nandigram, price rise and proper coordination among the parties in Uttar Pradesh elections, are believed to have figured, was sought by Railway Minister Lalu Prasad to discuss the future of the SEZ policy and the crisis in agriculture.

UNI